What Is a Businessman? A Creator or a Looter?
South Africa must reclaim the moral meaning of business before it is lost to corruption
Written by: Eustace Davie
In present-day South Africa, the word “businessman” is used so loosely that it now describes two opposing types of individuals: those who create value through voluntary exchange, and those who enrich themselves by extracting unearned wealth through political influence. This failure to distinguish between the two has undermined economic understanding and eroded respect for legitimate enterprise.
The businessman as creator
The true businessman is a creator and a producer. He identifies opportunities to produce goods or services that others want and need, and he risks his own capital and labour to meet those wants. He does not seek favours. He does not rely on tenders. His customers are free to reject his offering, and he earns only if he succeeds in improving their lives. This simple requirement, that income must be earned through mutually beneficial exchange, is what gives the businessman his moral legitimacy. He is rewarded because he serves other people, and because he does so with integrity.
There is no shortcut. No official can guarantee success. No bureaucrat shields him from competition, even amid South Africa’s stifling red tape and limited economic freedom. He cannot bribe his way to prosperity, because prosperity is determined by his ability to persuade free individuals to trade with him. He may fail; many do. But the failures of businessmen do not cost the public a cent. Profits, when they are achieved, reflect value created, not value taken.
Corruption is not business
Not a day goes by without a new scandal in which a corrupt individual secures a multi-million Rand government contract through political connections, delivers shoddy or incomplete services, and funnels taxpayers’ money into private luxury. Yet the media continue to describe such a person as a “businessman”. Referring to such a person as a businessman obscures the nature of what has taken place. There has been no value creation, no productive exchange, and nothing delivered to anyone. Taxpayers’ money that could have uplifted poor South Africans has been consumed for private gain, leaving nothing behind but loss.
The common feature of such corrupt individuals is that they operate not by serving customers, but by influencing government officials. They do not create. They do not produce. They do not serve. They manipulate procurement systems to secure contracts for which they deliver little or nothing. They win tenders through connections, not competence. They insert themselves between the taxpayer and the public purse, not to add value, but to extract it. The money they consume serves no productive purpose. It vanishes. What should have built clinics, roads, and schools is spent on luxury cars and patronage. In the process, they destroy trust, suffocate real business, and contribute directly to the country’s economic decline.
Business builds prosperity
By contrast, the true businessman is a creator of value. He builds where others talk. He provides jobs where others regulate. He delivers real solutions to the needs of the population that governments only promise to meet. His efforts strengthen society, expand opportunity, and foster independence.
The late Dr Richard Maponya, who received the Free Market Foundation’s Luminary Award in 2013, epitomised the qualities of a true businessman. The award recognised his lifetime achievement in business, especially under the severe constraints of apartheid-era legislation. Despite being denied access to bank loans and permits, he built one of South Africa’s most successful black-owned business empires, through persistence, personal risk, and unshakable integrity. He provided services, created employment, and inspired countless others to follow his example. He did not wait for permission. He did not loot. He produced.
A society that fails to distinguish between those who create value and those who extract it begins to collapse. When the corrupt are treated as legitimate and the producers as suspect, the incentive to build is destroyed. Economic activity then devolves into a contest for plunder, ending only in ruin.
The businessman is not a politically connected insider trading on influence. He is not a rent-seeker. He is not a looter. He is the individual who produces something of real value for willing buyers, under the discipline of competition.
We must restore the word “businessman” to its rightful owners: those who create, produce, and serve through voluntary exchange, who bear risk and act with integrity. Without such men and women, South Africa’s prosperity will remain out of reach.
Eustace Davie is President of the Free Market Foundation and author of Jobs for the Jobless and Unchain the Child